Penknife (![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png)
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crack_van2004-02-09 02:00 pm
penknife.livejournal.com) wrote in crack_van2004-02-09 02:00 pm
Entry tags:
Golden by Andraste (PG)
Fandom: X-MEN MOVIEVERSE
Pairing: Xavier/Magneto
Author on lj:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
andrastewhite
Author's website: Blue Shades
Why this must be read:
One fascinating relationship in the X-Men movies is between Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr, now a deadly enemy but once his closest friend. It's fairly easy in movieverse to get the idea that they were actually once more than friends, to the point that the Xavier/Magneto pairing is frequently assumed even in stories that focus on other characters entirely. It's a tragic pairing by its nature, with any happiness we see overshadowed by our knowledge that their bitter conflicts will eventually tear them apart.
In "Golden," Andraste gives us a brief look at the pair shortly before the first movie, in a late-night phone conversation that's a perfect example of the tangle of pain and love between them. It's also a nice look at Charles Xavier, who's not quite what his students think. It's wry and sharp and just as painful as it should be, especially for readers who've seen either of the movies and know that it's all about to get much, much worse.
Even twenty years ago, he had envisioned himself at this stage of his life as the man others believe him to be now: wise, ancient, calm and unthreateningly asexual. He's learned, however, that he still inhabits his body, old and damaged though it may be. He wants Erik with a visceral impulse that none of his young students' cruder means of reporting desire seem adequate to describe. The English language is well-supplied with adjectives, but he cannot find the correct noun.
He wants someone beside him in the bed, relieving the tedium of his perpetual insomnia with the sounds of a sleeping human - and Erik, sleeping, is just a human, no matter what he might believe awake. He wants to wake in the morning to the sound of the shower. Spend the day (which is now Sunday, he recalls) eating breakfast, arguing over the newspaper, collaborating on the crossword, reading, talking. To feel the kiss pressed to his forehead, or the inside of his wrist, the hand brushing the back of his neck.
The house, filled with children he considers his own, is far too quiet.
Golden
Pairing: Xavier/Magneto
Author on lj:
andrastewhiteAuthor's website: Blue Shades
Why this must be read:
One fascinating relationship in the X-Men movies is between Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr, now a deadly enemy but once his closest friend. It's fairly easy in movieverse to get the idea that they were actually once more than friends, to the point that the Xavier/Magneto pairing is frequently assumed even in stories that focus on other characters entirely. It's a tragic pairing by its nature, with any happiness we see overshadowed by our knowledge that their bitter conflicts will eventually tear them apart.
In "Golden," Andraste gives us a brief look at the pair shortly before the first movie, in a late-night phone conversation that's a perfect example of the tangle of pain and love between them. It's also a nice look at Charles Xavier, who's not quite what his students think. It's wry and sharp and just as painful as it should be, especially for readers who've seen either of the movies and know that it's all about to get much, much worse.
Even twenty years ago, he had envisioned himself at this stage of his life as the man others believe him to be now: wise, ancient, calm and unthreateningly asexual. He's learned, however, that he still inhabits his body, old and damaged though it may be. He wants Erik with a visceral impulse that none of his young students' cruder means of reporting desire seem adequate to describe. The English language is well-supplied with adjectives, but he cannot find the correct noun.
He wants someone beside him in the bed, relieving the tedium of his perpetual insomnia with the sounds of a sleeping human - and Erik, sleeping, is just a human, no matter what he might believe awake. He wants to wake in the morning to the sound of the shower. Spend the day (which is now Sunday, he recalls) eating breakfast, arguing over the newspaper, collaborating on the crossword, reading, talking. To feel the kiss pressed to his forehead, or the inside of his wrist, the hand brushing the back of his neck.
The house, filled with children he considers his own, is far too quiet.
Golden